


We need to practice the kiss!

by chrysanthemumsies



Category: Sherlock (TV) RPF
Genre: First Kiss, Freebatch - Freeform, M/M, Practice Kissing, RPF, Setlock, TJLC | The Johnlock Conspiracy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-25
Updated: 2016-12-25
Packaged: 2018-09-12 05:07:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,352
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9056629
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chrysanthemumsies/pseuds/chrysanthemumsies
Summary: It's May of 2016, and the Setlock team has just gotten the script containing the John/Sherlock kiss! So, of course, Martin and Ben need to practice a bit. Y'know. To make sure it's up to par. Some Johnlock elements to it as well. Just a cute little fic to hold us over before series 4!





	

09 May 2016

 

“‘ _ The Lying Detective’,”  _ Benedict read aloud, brows furrowing. The packet was thick and daunting, the weight of it heavy in more ways than one. “Sounds a bit dark, doesn’t it?” 

Martin was looking at his own script, tilting his head and eyes slightly squinted as if that would give any answers. “I s’pose,” he replied uneasily. “Mark promised that series 4 would be ‘worth the wait’. Fucker’s probably going to kill one of us off.”

Ben snickered, rolling the script in his hands. “He’s been trying to make Mycroft the main character this whole time, right?”

“Actually, the newest character will be Peter Capaldi. This has all been a promo for ‘Doctor Who’.”

Ben outright laughed this time, cheeks already hurting from smiling so much these past several weeks. While the times were demanding and the acting even moreso, Ben had nearly forgotten how much he had missed Martin, how much fun they had together. He patted his rolled-up packet against his palm. 

“I’m going to go do a quick mark-down before the readthrough tomorrow, see if I can mentally prepare for whatever they’ve planned,” he said. “Grab coffee in the morning? We’ll have much to talk about before the reading, I’d imagine.” 

“After what happened in  _ ‘The Six Thatchers’ _ ?” Martin muttered, already flipping through his copy with a dramatic frown. “I’ll have a whole fuckin’ pamphlet.” 

 

*** * ***

 

Hours later found Ben in his trailer, fingers stained with pink highlighter and neck cramping from hunching over his tiny desk. He was over halfway through, and while his body urged him to take a break, he knew that he’d feel guilty the whole time knowing that there’s work still to be done. 

His phone began to vibrate against the wood, Martin’s face flashing on the screen. Quirking his lips, Ben pressed ‘answer’ and tapped speakerphone. “Hey, what’s on?” 

“Fuck,” Martin’s voice drawled, utterly graveled. “Ben, you’ll never… oi,  _ fuck!  _ Do you- I mean, have you…” 

Ben leaned back in his seat, bemused. “Everything alright?” 

“Page 221.” 

Ben scoffed at the number, though he knew better than to think it wasn’t something important to the creators. “I’m only on page 198, no spoilers.” 

Martin huffed on the line. “I’ll wait.”

Smiling, Ben leaned back forward to continue with the mark-down, occasionally muttering out a comment to Martin as he went. His smile gradually disappeared, though, and by the time he made it to page 221 (and more importantly, what  _ happened  _ on that page), he couldn’t help an incredulous: “Oh,  _ fuck!”  _

“That’s what I bloody said!” Martin replied, voice higher-lilted in disbelief. His voice was shaky, wind whipping at his phone as he (presumably) walked. “I mean, yeah, we all knew that this was the direction they’ve been heading all these years, but, I just, I still can’t wrap my head around it.” 

Ben could. Oh, he could. He felt a grin grow across his cheeks, uninvited and, frankly, unable to stop. “Brilliant!” He could help but say. “Martin, don’t you see? This is… it’s revolutionary, is what it is. If we pull this off…” He shook his head, eyes glued on the page in wonder. “Martin, this could change  _ television.  _ Mark and Steven and Sue an-and  _ us,  _ we’ll be known to the  _ world  _ as the first adaptation of Sherlock Holmes to  _ do this _ . To make  _ history.  _ It’s bloody fantastic! _ ”  _

A pause, and then: “ _ Shit!”  _ Martin exclaimed, though he was far from upset. Ben could imagine him running a hand through his hair, a tick he picked up after he changed the style. “Ben, we have to… I promise I’m not attempting to steal your virtue or anything, but don’t you think we need to practice this? I know tomorrow’s just a readthrough, but I don’t… I honestly don’t know how I’m supposed to act. How  _ John’s  _ supposed to act.” 

Ben chuckled at that, but he was in wholehearted agreement. “Yes, yes, of course! Do you have time right now?”

“Already on my way to your trailer.” 

After hanging up, Ben was about to settle back into his chair, but then he froze, the realization dumping onto him like ice water oozing down his spine. 

Martin was coming to his trailer to  _ kiss  _ him. Martin Freeman, arguably one of the finest actors Ben has ever worked with (one of the best  _ anyone  _ has ever worked with, frankly), was going to kiss him. Benedict. In his trailer. Soon. Their lips would touch. Depending on what they decide, maybe tongue.

Oh, god. The heat rose to Ben’s face before he could stop it, and he hurried to his sink to brush his teeth. 

 

*** * ***

 

“No, no, Sherlock wouldn’t initiate the kiss, that’s bollocks,” Martin argued, crossing his arms at his chest as he paced in the small room. “He wouldn’t dare. He’s been in love with John for years and he’s, well, he’s  _ constantly  _ being shit on for having these feelings.” 

“ _ Exactly,”  _ Ben argued right back, script forgotten in his hand as he gestured. “He’s killed himself in more ways than one for John, hasn’t he? The man’s at his breaking point. Definitely after all the shit we’re making him go through in this episode already. He doesn’t  _ want  _ to kiss John; he  _ needs _ to, yeah?”

“I just don’t think he’d take that leap,” Martin replied, though he was more quizzical than argumentative, running a hand through his hair with a scrunched brow. “But I don’t see John doing it, either. Then again, Mark never bothered to let us know if he and Sholto ever even shagged. Will I have to act out a sexual identity crisis? That’s fucking overplayed.” 

Ben nodded in agreement, and then sat on the edge of his tiny bed with a sigh, glancing back over the dreaded page once again. There wasn’t any of the lengthy description Mark and Steven liked to throw into their scripts; just lines of dialogue, and then [They kiss]. Obviously, the creators will either open it up for discussion tomorrow, or leave it to Ben and Martin to improvise. It wouldn’t be the first time. “So, the kiss will have to be mutual, then. Well, sort of. Like giving into ‘temptation’, something like that, don’t you think? Unavoidable.”

After a moment, Martin nodded, stopping his pacing to lean against the wall opposite of Ben. “Yeah, I could definitely see it happening that way. Alright. Let’s do a couple run-throughs of these two, three pages, and then we’ll do a dry acting run and see where it takes us.”

Ben scratched at his temple, flipping back a couple of pages and humming in his chest. “On your lead, then.”

The scene was powerful, really. A large part of this season was blatant mind-buggery, if that made any sort of sense, relying on special effects and curious transitions that made the audience think they knew what they were watching. This episode in particular featured a drugged Sherlock, meaning that the point of view panned back and forth from real life and Mind Palace. On any other show that would be a cop-out, but it worked wonders for character development when featured here, and not exclusively development for only Sherlock. 

In this particular scene, Sherlock was drugged out of his mind (not from his own doing) and imagining himself in a morgue, Culverton taunting him with John as fuel for his words. Sherlock, easily influential in such a state, fell further and further distraught, firmly believing himself that John is dying on the hospital bed, and lashes out. Only, in the real world, he’s having a meltdown and is imaging real-life John as Culverton, and ends up going to attack him. Whenever John throws a punch to subdue him (and retaliate), Sherlock comes into the present with both a sense of horrified disbelief and urgency. John, this all happening immediately after the whole Mary fiasco, isn’t too stable himself. 

From there, [They kiss]. Are they still against the wall? Or did Sherlock fall to the floor from the hit? If so, does John follow him down, or help him up? The possibilities were endless. 

After the third readthrough, Ben got his familiar Sherlockian nuances down, and him and Martin had back the comfortable chemistry that got them hired together in the first place. Martin fell back into himself with a sigh, breaking character to toss his script onto the bed and stretch his arms behind his back. It was beginning to darken outside. Ben sat heavily back down onto the edge of his bed. 

“You good?” Martin asked. 

“Hm? Oh, yeah, yeah, great. Just… thinking.” Ben rubbed at his lips absentmindedly, frowning down at the page. He wouldn’t need the script this go around, but the ambiguity of it all was still gnawing at him. Martin cleared his throat and perched on the bed beside him. 

“Nervous?” He asked quietly. 

Ben felt a blush begin to creep up. “Erm…” he tried. 

Martin nudged their shoulders. “Yeah, same here. I’m scared out of my mind, meself. You’re right, this is a huge fucking deal, can and will change the media. We have to do this right.”

“Right,” Ben agreed softly. Softly, he pushed their shoulders together again. “Of course you’re right. Ready to put actions to words?” 

Martin smiled, utterly charming. “Always.”

In the end, it was all so startlingly simple. Backed against the wall, Martin threw a false punch and Ben feigned a fall, onto to have Martin grab him up by the shoulders and push him against the wall with overstated power. A charged moment where both men stared into each others’ eyes, one set angry but breaking and the other utterly heartbroken with overwhelming vulnerability. 

They weren’t Martin and Ben anymore. In this moment, they were John and Sherlock, the weight of the series on their shoulders and the fate of the world in their hands. 

“John,” Ben breathed, a hiccup of a sob at the end of the name. 

Martin’s eyes darted between his, face battling between anger and his own frantic deduction, trying to place definitions to the naked emotions on his friend’s face, and Ben saw the precise moment he came to the conclusion built over six years. “Oh, god,” Martin murmured, eyes widening at what they concluded and beginning to swim. “ _ Sherlock.” _

In a move as if choreographed, Ben’s hands scrabbled at Martin’s shoulders helplessly and Martin’s fingers wound into the curls at the back of his head, and both men tugged their mouths together with equal parts desperation and fire. 

It was immediately apparent that Martin would be taking the lead, pressing Ben into the wall with the his lips and mouth dragging powerfully as he moved, stubble catching on Ben’s cheek and chin. Ben let out a helpless noise and started to buckle, forcing Martin to keep him upright with his body, firm and unyielding. Martin dropped his hands to Ben’s sides, kneading into the muscles there, and at Ben’s gasp he chased their tongues together. Ben reached up to cradle Martin’s face as Sherlock would do. 

“Mm,” Ben groaned in his throat. He pulled back to take a gasping breath, knocking their foreheads together. “John,” he whispered against his lips. “John, John,  _ John.” _

Martin went to push their open mouths together, only he stopped at just a brush, teasing and humid as they breathed each other in. They slitted their eyes open at the same moment, heady and unfocused, captured in each others gaze. Keeping eye contact, Martin slowly dipped his head to capture Ben’s bottom lip between his own, a last, soft caress with a hint of wet. Ben let out a shaky exhale, eyes dropping closed. Martin pulled away.

Ben thumped his head against the wall behind him, catching his breath. Martin’s hands slid from his waist, leaving behind a trail of cool air, and Ben could hear that his breathing was affected as well. Opening his eyes, he saw Martin staring off somewhere beside Ben’s shoulder, face steely and fists clenched at his sides. Defensive.

“John,” Ben hoarsed. He tried for demanding, but it came out frightened. “John, look at me.  _ Please.”  _

At that, Martin dragged his eyes to Ben’s at once, the expression on his face as open as he’s ever been, eyes wide and lips pursed and utterly afraid. Ben wanted to cry, lips unsteady and lashes fluttering in quick blinks. The atmosphere was charged with something expectant, invisible,  _ electric.  _

And then Martin quirked his lips, and Ben stifled a giggle with a choke, and then both men were falling onto the floor laughing with only half-amusement, the other half joy. 

“You brushed your teeth!” Martin bellowed, holding at his stomach. “You bloody fuckin’ man, you-”

“And you didn’t!” Ben snickered back. “Do I detect a trace of coffee? My, Martin, it’s much too late-”

Martin jabbed him in the stomach with his foot, face wonderfully scrunched in laughter. “Oh, god,” he bemoaned. “We can’t do this on set, y’know. We’ll have to go through twenty takes, at this rate.”

That would be perfectly fine. Ben worried that he accidentally said that one out loud. “You’re good,” he blurted, trying to seem more nonchalant and less like a fucking fangirl. 

“Correction, John Watson is good,” Martin said, leaning back against the tiny nightstand with an almost smug look on his face. “Well, I’m bloody fantastic as well, but. Y’know. So’s John.”

Ben tried to hide his grin, but it was hopeless. “I think we have a winner, then. Do you think we can recreate it when the time comes?” 

Martin leaned forward expectantly, a devilish grin on his face. “Do we need to practice it again, then?” 

In the end, it only took one take. The costars were watching off-camera with a look of disbelief on their faces, Rupert having had leaked his cup of coffee on his shoes without even noticing. Mark and Steven kept up a professional face, but when they took lunch they couldn’t help giggling throughout the full hour, unable to contain themselves. Arwel had to have his phone taken away for the rest of the day. 

That take was enough. 

**Author's Note:**

> Follow my blog [@chrysanthemumsies](http://chrysanthemumsies.tumblr.com/) for all things Johnlock and fic related!


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